State legislators, officials and small-business owners and
advocates have agreed to work toward a number of key changes
designed to ease the paperwork burdens many entrepreneurs face and
to make more capital available.

The agreement was hammered out at the 13th National Legislative
Conference on Small Business Issues, held in San Diego in
December.

Among the concerns addressed was creating one form that both
federal and state governments will accept for payroll tax filing,
says Jere Glover of the Small Business Administration's Office
of Advocacy.

"There's no reason to report the same information in
slightly different formats to different agencies," insists
Glover, adding that states that are interested in exploring the
idea include Arkansas, Hawaii, Maryland, West Virginia and
Wisconsin. Montana has already consolidated its state-required
forms and also wants to work with the federal government.

To facilitate this streamlining effort, Glover says that for the
first time the IRS has agreed to accept payroll information from
the states. Glover believes this action could reduce by one-third
the time entrepreneurs spend filing payroll tax information.

"We also discussed states depositing their money in banks
that lend to small businesses," says Glover. "Some states
already do that. We gave New York an award because the state
legislature passed a law that says if a bank agrees to increase its
lending to small business, the state will give those banks priority
[consideration as places to keep state money]."

Glover's office estimates this action by states could
increase the amount of capital available to small businesses.

In addition to these issues, Glover says governors and state
legislators have voiced a strong consensus to follow the federal
government's lead of reducing paperwork requirements for small
businesses by 25 percent over the next three years.

The small-business advocate believes the net result of all this
reduction is a big gain for entrepreneurs, who will be able to
spend more time running their companies.